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Ex-Intelligence Officials Cite Low Spirits at CIA

From the Washington Post, Sunday, written by Walter Pincus and Joby Warrick

1. Morale at Langley is shot, due to Obama/Holder's double-dealing politicization of CIA methods, according to many senior CIA insiders

2. Meanwhile, the inspector general, Helgerson, who previously reviewed all this stuff about power drills, faked executions and empty threats (LOL!), and found nothing indictable says now that going forward is LIKELY TO GO NOWHERE

3. The previous Justice Dept ok'd in letter the procedures employed by those now facing prosecution, Helgerson explains

4. CIA higher ups specifically approved the tactics used by the lower level lackeys about to be put thru the wringer, supposedly, by Holder/Obama

5. I say "supposedly" because this particular prosecution is such a political loser, it won't move an inch

6. Still, the little guys being leveraged will have to lawyer up against Holder's hassling

7. Most importantly, to get even an indictment, Helgerson says, the no-name prosecutor picked by the president must prove INTENT, a practical impossibility

8. Veteran voices within the CIA assert that agents will not take risks, ongoing, thus weakening US security

9. They fear that methods considered kosher today will be reversed by LATER administration's for POLITICAL purposes

10. Many high level agents, some in management, have been making phone calls "seeking advice about new employment," reports The Washington Post

11. While The Post recognizes that a comprehensive sampling of the thousands of agency employees is impossible, among the dozens involved in the programs in question, "feelings run high" concerning the poor treatment meted to lifetime servicemembers by this cheaply expedient president

12. The White House was warned back in December that its political playing of CIA careerists was gonna backfire badly

13. But obtuse Obama obliviously believed the brouhaha would be a two day story

14. LOLOL!

15. Other top level informants told The Post they resent the administration's "double standard"

16. That is, juicy details that might prove obstacles to Obama's present efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan have been withheld, they say, while those intended to embarrass the previous president have been gossiped to the world

17. Helgerson points to the case of the agent who pointed a gun at a detainee and threatened him with a power drill

18. The agent in question was subject to immediate disciplinary action

19. The documents RELEASED BY HOLDER indicate that valuable information was extracted thru interrogation

20. They refuse to conclude, however, either one way or the other, that attacks were or weren't staved off, nor whether the info gleaned was or wasn't the result of EIT's

Morale has sagged at the CIA following the release of additional portions of an inspector general's review of the agency's interrogation program and the announcement that the Justice Department would investigate possible abuses by interrogators, according to former intelligence officials, especially those associated with the program.

A. B. "Buzzy" Krongard, the third-ranking CIA official at the time of the use of harsh interrogation practices, said that although vigorous oversight is crucial, the public airing of once-classified internal assessments and the prospect of further investigation are damaging the agency. "Morale at the agency is down to minus 50," he said.

At the same time, former inspector general John L. Helgerson, whose review of the program was largely declassified Monday, said that the release, though painful, would ensure that the agency confronts difficult issues head on, instead of ignoring or trying to bury them.

Helgerson also said it would be "very difficult" to mount a successful prosecution of any of the individuals who participated in the program. The Bush-era Justice Department "approved the program orally and in writing; the agency's chain of command was involved. There would be no jury appeal, and I do not believe there was any criminal intent among those involved," Helgerson said.

Krongard, one of the few active or retired CIA officers with direct knowledge of the program willing to voice publicly what many officers are saying privately, said agency personnel now may back away from controversial programs that could place them in personal legal jeopardy should their work be exposed. "The old saying goes, 'Big operation, big risk; small operation, small risk; no operation, no risk.' "

"If you're not in the intelligence business to be forward-leaning, you might as well not be in it," Krongard said.

A retired former senior CIA official said that since the announcement that the Justice Department would investigate the agency's interrogation tactics, he has received many calls from serving intelligence officers, some in high management positions, seeking advice about new jobs or lawyers. "This is a bad one," he said.

It is impossible to extrapolate from the small sample contacted by Washington Post reporters about the effect the varied inquiries are having on the thousands of agency employees, more than one-third of whom are spread around the world. But among the dozens of officials who were part of the program and either remain active or have retired, feelings run high about how the White House and the Justice Department have handled the issue.

One former senior official said President Obama was warned in December that release of the Justice Department memos sanctioning harsh interrogation methods would create an uproar that could not be contained. "They [the White House] thought that it would be a two-day story; they were wrong," this official said.

A much-discussed question is whether the legal reassurances of one administration carry over to its successor. "When a previous administration says something was legal, and the next says it doesn't matter, the result is hesitancy to take on cutting-edge missions," the former senior official warned.

Another former top official said senior managers detect a double standard. He pointed out that Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. supported Obama's decision not to release photos of military abuses of detainees in Afghanistan and Iraq because they would harm military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. "The warning that CIA operations would be made more difficult were disregarded," former official said.

Helgerson's review showed that CIA officials involved in the program anticipated the possibility of disclosure and investigation. "A number of agency officers of various grade levels . . . involved with detention and interrogation activities are concerned that they may at some future date be vulnerable to legal action . . . and that the U.S. government will not stand behind them," the 2004 report reads.

One former official cited the case of an officer who threatened a nude and hooded al-Qaeda member, Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, by holding a gun to his head and later a hand drill.

"A security officer reported the gun to head that day," he said. The next day, that officer was flown back home and action was taken, he added.

The two documents indicated that the CIA gained valuable information from interrogating senior al-Qaeda suspects, though there was no firm evidence that imminent attacks were halted, or that waterboarding and other harsh techniques were decisive. The CIA declined comment on the report, but an intelligence official familiar with the incident said the agency did not withhold information favorable to Cheney's viewpoint.

Re: Low Spirits at CIA

What do you expect from democrats?

They have always made playing politics a higher priority than the well being of the country. After 8 years of the democrats putting their quest for political power first, by falsely claiming the president lied about intelligence to invade Iraq, comparing out troops to those of Hitler, Stalin and Pol Pot, publicly revealing national security secrets on how the war on terrorism was being conducted, and publicly embarrassing the US by questioning our motives in the war in Iraq at every turn, did you really think that them gaining that political power they sold America out for, was going to change who they were?

Liberals will always be liberals, and that means playing politics will always trump everything else.

Re: Low Spirits at CIA

Look no further than this rancid thread of why the GOP finds itself out of power.

Authoritarians have taken over. No respect for the Rule of Law.

They gleefully cheer when our elected elites flaunt our Nations laws.

Here is what one our Founding Fathers had to say about the law and punishment.

Thomas Paine

An avidity to punish is always dangerous to liberty. It leads men to stretch, to misinterpret, and to misapply even the best of laws. He that would make his own liberty secure must guard even his enemy from oppression; for if he violates this duty he establishes a precedent that will reach to himself.

[Via Glenn Greenwald] Can that be any clearer? Of course, Paine also wrote in Common Sense that "so far as we approve of monarchy, that in America the law is king" and "in free countries the law ought to be king; and there ought to be no other." And in his Dissertations, he also wrote:

The executive is not invested with the power of deliberating whether it shall act or not; it has no discretionary authority in the case; for it can act no other thing than what the laws decree, and it is obliged to act conformably thereto. . . .

Re: Low Spirits at CIA

Law?

You mean how the DOJ already investigated this issue?

That was law... While this is nothing but playing politics by the Obama Administration.

Which by the way, I hope they continue to do, because it will be the quickest way for the democrats to get bounced right the hell out of power again. If you don't believe me, take a gander at the latest approval ratings.

Past the edge of the universe, through the singularity, and out the other side.

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Re: Low Spirits at CIA

Originally Posted by dragondad

Boo hoo! How terrible!

There is a small chance the US might uphold the law!

How unfair of them to do that to "Patriots" who tortured other human beings in the name of Freedom!

Which law has been violated? The domestic and international definitions of torture are entirely subjective as both use the subjective qualifier of "severe" so in actuality ones definition of torture is left to their own personal opinion of what qualifies as severe. I don't consider things; such as, waterboarding as severe. There needs to be a set standard of what exactly is and is not permitted as interrogation techniques and until that happens no law could have been violated and seeing as we in the U.S. have a constitutional prohibition of ex post facto prosecution these officers can not be prosecuted for the alleged mistreatment of detainees.